50 years of Nigerian Sports – through my eyes!

Before 1960 – a blur

On the eve of Nigeria’s 50th Independence Anniversary I am thinking. My life has been very closely related to the ‘life’ of my country. Although I was born a few years before Nigeria was ‘born’ as an independent nation I must admit that those early years are but a blur in my mind as I was obviously too young to fully grasp the import of events at the time. So, I recall almost nothing about my life before 1960.

From 1960 to 1970 – foundation!

Of the years immediately after 1960 I can recall a few things – our home on Yandoka Street, my days in St. Theresa’s boys primary school, Chief Obafemi Awolowo dropping campaign  leaflets from a helicopter in the sky, and…well…we would have to move quickly through time to the mid-1960s for my recall to start to crystallise into any other thing of substance or significance. I remember the 1966 pogrom very vividly, though, with it’s devastating effect on my young and innocent mind, the empty classrooms in most secondary schools as a result of the exodus of my Igbo school mates and friends, the civil war and its hangover on everyone and everything in the country, and, on a positive note, the incredible exploits of the Plateau Highlanders FC in the national Challenge Cup football competition. That last bit is a like a rubber stamp on my mind. It has refused to fade away. In those days, somehow, the team from Jos would always fight its way to the finals of Nigeria’s most prestigious football championship and then lose! The entire town would be glued to radio sets following the enrapturing commentaries of Isola Folorunsho and co, the disappointments, anger and pain, reminders  of the annual defeats!

Otherwise, my thoughts  of those years are filled mostly with the memory of beatings I received from my Mum either for my dirty, torn or lost school uniforms as a result of my daily, after-school football games on the streets of Jos, or for neglecting to carry out my home chores. Those days were also partly filled with the fantasy of waking up one morning and discovering that during the night I had been magically transformed into a football ‘god’ like Samuel Garba, Tunde Abeki, Christopher ‘Ajilo’ Udemezue, Peter Anieke, Ismaila Mabo, Mathew Atuegbu, Datti Lawandi and several other local but outstanding football giants who were our neighbours.

Life in Jos was very ‘narrow’ as a result of the total absence of any local media (electronic or print) in the town in those days.  Our social life consisted mostly of local football games, the Sunday afternoon live-music by the ‘greatest’ band in my world (Sahara All Stars band), and the Indian and American Cowboy films at the Rex and New Era cinemas. Nothing else existed in my social landscape. My only source of some news were the few foreign magazines available in the St. Murumba College library, the BBC World Service that every radio set in town was tuned to, and the voice of Yvonne Barclay on a daily one-hour radio musical evening program on the Voice of America on radio,  That was my world beyond the surrounding hills of the Plateau. Lagos was a very distant land, London was another planet and Washington a distant galaxy. Even though ‘Independence’ was explained to me it did not make much sense.  What mattered was that it was very welcome. Its attendant annual October 1 public holiday provided me escape from school, an opportunity to dress up in a clean uniform and congregate with other children for the march-past and parade at the stadium, and return to my street games afterwards.  That was what Independence Day anniversary meant to me!

1970 to 1990  – the golden years!

Even though I readily admit that the years immediately before and after 1960 are now a blur in my mind, surely not so were the years after, at the turn of that first decade after. From leaving secondary school in 1970, leaving the city of Jos and settling down into a new life in the ‘university town‘ of Ibadan, and going through higher education, my life and the ‘life’ of Nigeria grew simultaneously with both undergoing dramatic transformation. For me, in the space of only one ‘breathless’ decade starting from 1971, I joined a proper football club, won my first local trophy, earned my first income from football, played my first international match, graduated from the Polytechnic in flying colours, joined and played for the national football team, did my compulsory one year National Youth Service  (the NYSC), won a continental club championship trophy, got nominated three times as one of Africa’s best players, went to the Olympics, travelled the world, got married, became a household name in most of Africa, won the most prestigious African football championship, and realised that through that decade I had been a very active participant in the development of a solid foundation for sports development in Nigeria. All of that incredible and unbelievable journey took place between 1971 and 1980. Those were some of the best years of my life. Incidentally, they were also some of the best years of my country. Life was good. After the civil-war years national life was filled with hope, progress and development in all spheres. That decade witnessed unprecedented infrastructural development around the country. There was so much money in the country that the then Head of State was reported to have said that money was not Nigeria’s problem but how to spend it. How true! I learnt that the country was so awash with money that some people actually imported saw-dust and sand from abroad to build their houses! I also knew of a gentleman in WNTV/WNBS who would always air-freight his Jaguar car to London for service and repairs. In those years undergraduates were offered jobs and car loans even before they had sat for their final exams. For those of us in sport, although many got scholarships to go to America to study and do their sport, many others disregarded the readily available opportunities and chose to either study here or do their sport locally because Nigeria was such a good place to live in that there was no incentive to leave the country. You could get up and just travel to the UK without a visa; a Volkswagen Beetle car sold for a little over two thousand Naira; the Naira was at par with the Pound Sterling in terms of value; before our very eyes Nigeria was developing into one of the fastest growing economies in the world. When Nigeria hosted the Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture took place in 1977 to celebrate the cultural heritage of Africa and the Black race many of the visitors that came for the event tasted Nigeria and decided it was too good to leave. Many from more developed countries abroad ‘stowed’ away in the country avoiding  Immigration officers who wanted to send them back to their countries! Life in Nigeria was that good.

Like other aspects of life, sports also benefited from the good times. Athletes of the 1970 to 1980 generation became the willing ‘guinea pigs’ of Nigeria’s sports development experiment even if we did not realise so at the time. Those pioneering efforts were very important and set the foundation for Nigerian sports development that sustained the country even when things started to go wrong as the 1990s approached.

1990 to the present -the locust years!

In the years previous Nigerian sport was on the ascendancy in the continent and the country became a global force in some of the sports. Several continental and a few world championships were won in table tennis, athletics, boxing and football. Some of this sporadic victories continued even when development grounded to a halt in the 1990s.  Thats why we can point to Barcelona in 1992 and Atlanta in 1996 and understand what could have happened – how we could have won anything without a proper development programme in place. But the truth is that in the 1990s sports lost their innocence, independence and direction, and became a weapon of destruction and exploitation in the hands of a few administrators who had agenda different from those of developing the youths of the country, encouraging mass participation at all levels, combining sports with education in the schools, encouraging sports and education through provision of scholarships in tertiary institutions, exposing the best talents to the best coaching, training and competition at home and abroad, training the trainers for capacity building, and rewarding all those that excelled. From 1990 the oasis have turned into deserts and the fertile fields into wastelands. The system destroyed the structures and the institutions that made sports to grow in the first three decades. Now we are left with the remains of unfulfilled dreams, the occasional pyrrhic and shallow victories, wasted opportunities, and whole generations of youths denied the opportunity and wasting away in this ocean of opportunity that the global sports industry offers. Sports may have been very limited in the scope of their influence and contribution to our national achievements but surely even in the darkest of times, through some of the worst periods of our political history, sports have managed to provide us with some psychological relief, managed to light up our ‘darkness’, and managed also to provide a ray of hope for our youths.

‘Champions are made when no one is watching, and history is made when the world is watching!’

The world is focussed on Nigeria. I am focussed on all those champions who worked when no one was watching and brought honour and glory to fatherland. In the past 50 years these Nigerian sportsmen and women have remained faithful to that cause. Having played their part they have retired to the cocoon of their other interests waiting for when history will honour them. As the people celebrate 50 years of Independence,  I want to bring to their remembrance the names of many of those men and women whose history charts the course of Nigeria’s Golden age in sports. As the world watches, this is my special acknowledgment to many of them that I knew, some of who were or are still my  personal friends. To those whose names or faces I may not recall or miss out accept my apologies!

In athletics: Gloria Ayanlaja, Pamela Williams, Musa Dogonyaro, Taiwo Ogunjobi, David Ejoke, Samson Oyeledun, Dele Udoh, Demola Oyefeso, Benedict Majekodunmi, Kola Abdullahi, Kemi Sangodeyi, Mairo Jinadu, Emilia Edet, Violet Odogwu, Falilat Ogunkoya, Mary Onyali, Fatima Yusuf, Charity Opara, Chioma Ajunwa, Sunday Bada, Chidi Imoh, Deji Aliu, Olapade Adenekan, Henry Amike, Waziri Muhammed, Yusuf Ali, Charlton Ehizuelen, Godwin Obasogie, Felix Imabiyi, Bruce Ijirigho, Harrison Salami, Osmond and Davidson Ezinwa, Innocent Egbunike, Olusola Fasoba, Blessing Okagbare, and others.

In boxing; Davidson Andeh, Obisia Nwankpa, Jeremiah Okorodudu, John Martins, Hogan Jimoh, Joe Lasisi, Dele Jonathan, Ngozika Ekwelum, Tony Andeh, Bashiru Ali, and Fatai Ayinla.

In Table tennis: Lawunmi Majekodunmi, Engore Toun, Bose Kaffo, Cecilia Erinle, Atanda Musa, Kasali Lasisi, Babatunde Obisanya, and many others.

In Lawn tennis, David Imonitie, Nduka Odizor, Tony Mmoh, Rolake Olateru-Olagbegi, Sadiq Abdullahi, Bulus Husseini, Rashidi Oloyede, Joe Anan, Remi Osho, Kehinde Ajayi, Lawrence Awopegba, Thomson Onibokun and Yemisi Allan.

In Basketball I recall Uche Nebedum, Josephine Akiga,  Akeem Olajuwon, Yomi ‘Basket’, Scott Nnaji, Bala Ahmed and many young basketabll players that are taking the game to new heights at the moment.
By Segun Odegbami.